Review: Craftsman Co made-to-measure suede jacket

A couple of months ago I started the process of trialling Craftsman Co, a new and small Hong Kong-based company that is making leather and suede jackets.

The process was smooth and well run, but the end results were a little mixed: good but not perfect fit, and some quality issues.

Craftsman Co was set up in 2015 by three young menswear enthusiasts who met on a forum in Hong Kong.

They observed that their options for buying leather jackets were largely over-priced fashion brands or low-quality high-street stores, both of which changed their collections every season.

So they set up Craftsman Co to produce classic designs, at a high level of quality but below designer prices.

All the jackets are made to order, and all sales online. So they take full advantage in their pricing of having no stock, no overheads, and local (Hong Kong) manufacturing.

They also offer a made-to-measure service for a small uplift, which is what I tried. This added $50 to the ready-to-wear price of $880.

The MTM process involves taking a set of measurements on yourself (I involved a local tailor) and then being sent a voile fitting to try on and note alterations. You also take photos at both stages.

The design I picked was the A1 flying jacket in snuff suede. The guys sent across several samples of suedes and linings on a card, and even secured a different version of the snuff.

However, one thing it was difficult to judge was the final colour, from just a small sliver of the suede.

The resulting jacket was more orange than I anticipated, and between the two options of a lighter-coloured ribbing (shown here) and a darker version, I should perhaps have chosen the latter.

The fitting I received was pretty good - just a little big in the waist and long in the sleeves. Small adjustments.

The final jacket, however, had a few issues. The fit in the waist was good, as was the length of the body and sleeves. But it was tight across the chest and shoulders, and my sloping shoulders could have been better dealt with at the front.

The fit was still better than most RTW options, but there were obvious areas that could be improved.

Although it’s not necessarily a fair comparison - given his experience and being done face to face - the fit of my jacket from Davide Taub at Gieves & Hawkes was a lot better.

The quality of the suede was decent, if not amazing. On a par, for example, with Ralph Lauren Polo suede jackets I’ve had, but not Purple Label.

The buttons and hardware were good, as was the bemberg lining.

The work inside, however, was a little uneven. In the image above, look at the finishing around the side of the inside pockets, where the same spot has been repeatedly sewn over back and forth, leaving quite a messy finish.

I think there’s potentially a good service here if Craftsman Co can improve their fitting process further and correct some quality issues. After all, there are few MTM leather jackets out there under $1000.

For the moment, I’m concentrating on having some of my RTW jackets altered - which has the the advantage of being able to see the design and leather first hand, and then improve its fit.

Dear Simon, looks great! I have one very similar jacket bought at Dorianis, heavily lined in a beautiful cashmere. Sadly it’s a tad large now that I’ve lost some weight, do you know if one could alter a leather jacket like that? Who’d you give it to?

I believe you can only be considered a true denim head if your jeans are raw, non sanforised, thirty years old and have never been washed (apart from a quick dip in the Californian Pacific, followed by a roll in the sand)

As a young-ish reader, it’s great to see you continuing to experiment with more casual pieces rather than preaching the formal jacket/shirt/tie-even-at-weekends mantra espoused elsewhere. Hard to tell fit from the photos but it looks great. I picked up a similar jacket from Eidos recently but made from navy casentino wool, suprisingly versatile. Cheers.

Very interesting question from ANM. Although your articles about your personal commissions are always very insightful, the six million dollar question that remains unanswered is with what level of skill do tailors adapt their house styles to deal with the long, broad and short of it ? It would be great if you could find a way to address this issue. In reality this is what bespoke is all about.

Nice jacket! I was wondering if you’d compared it to something like the A-1 from the Aero Leather Company in Scotland? I don’t think they offer a specifically made to measure option, but I know people go to the factory and can be measured. For the price, it would be interesting to see how their less MTM version compared.

Interesting that you said to go for Valstar considering the price of them are circa £700 compared to the $950 of Craftman- that’s more or less the same price so wouldn’t one go for Craftman for the added benefits of fit, choice of colour, lining etcetc.

Quite intrigued why you said to go for Valstar?

Regarding the comment about other MTM leather jacket makers- it’s actually in this post- this is what you said- “I think there’s potentially a good service here if Craftsman Co can improve their fitting process further and correct some quality issues. After all, there are few MTM leather jackets out there under $1000.”

You can pick details with Craftsman Co, yes, but the finishing wasn’t great on the one I had – as I mentioned. Better on Valstar. There’s also a decent risk that if you start changing the details, and the fit, that you will end up with something worse, not better. So on my Craftsman jacket, for example, I didn’t like the colour I ended up with that much.

On my quote, I meant that there are few makers, ie there aren’t many. Not that there are ‘a’ few. It’s a turn of phrase, intended to mean that there aren’t any I’m aware of.

I’ll be doing an in-person bespoke safari jacket with them and was wondering if an unlined navy lambsuede safari jacket was appropriate for summer/spring. Would wool work better? I’d like to wear the jacket out casually and dress it up during work.

I personally love the look and feel of suede but wonder if it will be too hot to wear even if unlined in Southern California weather.